The Interpretation of Dreams

by Sigmund Freud

Whether we love or hate Sigmund Freud, we all have to admit that he revolutionized the way we think about ourselves. Much of this revolution can be traced to The Interpretation of Dreams, the turn-of-the-century tour de force that outlined his theory of unconscious forces in the context of dream analysis. Introducing the id, the superego, and their problem child, the ego, Freud advanced scientific understanding of the mind immeasurably by exposing motivations normally invisible to our consciousness. While there's no question that his own biases and neuroses influenced his observations, the details are less important than the paradigm shift as a whole. After Freud, our interior lives became richer and vastly more mysterious.

These mysteries clearly bothered him--he went to great (often absurd) lengths to explain dream imagery in terms of childhood sexual trauma, a component of his theory jettisoned mid-century, though now popular among recovered-memory therapists. His dispassionate analyses of his own dreams are excellent studies for cognitive scientists wishing to learn how to sacrifice their vanities for the cause of learning. Freud said of the work contained in The Interpretation of Dreams, "Insight such as this falls to one's lot but once in a lifetime." One would have to feel quite fortunate to shake the world even once. --Rob Lightner

Genres: Psychology, Nonfiction, Philosophy, Classics, Science, Psychoanalysis, Theory

452 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1899

About the author

Dr. Sigismund Freud (later changed to Sigmund) was a neurologist and the founder of psychoanalysis, who created an entirely new approach to the understanding of the human personality. He is regarded as one of the most influential—and controversial—minds of the 20th century.

In 1873, Freud began to study medicine at the University of Vienna. After graduating, he worked at the Vienna General Hospital. He collaborated with Josef Breuer in treating hysteria by the recall of painful experiences under hypnosis. In 1885, Freud went to Paris as a student of the neurologist Jean Charcot. On his return to Vienna the following year, Freud set up in private practice, specialising in nervous and brain disorders. The same year he married Martha Bernays, with whom he had six children.

Freud developed the theory that humans have an unconscious in which sexual and aggressive impulses are in perpetual conflict for supremacy with the defences against them. In 1897, he began an intensive analysis of himself. In 1900, his major work 'The Interpretation of Dreams' was published in which Freud analysed dreams in terms of unconscious desires and experiences.

In 1902, Freud was appointed Professor of Neuropathology at the University of Vienna, a post he held until 1938. Although the medical establishment disagreed with many of his theories, a group of pupils and followers began to gather around Freud. In 1910, the International Psychoanalytic Association was founded with Carl Jung, a close associate of Freud's, as the president. Jung later broke with Freud and developed his own theories.

After World War One, Freud spent less time in clinical observation and concentrated on the application of his theories to history, art, literature and anthropology. In 1923, he published 'The Ego and the Id', which suggested a new structural model of the mind, divided into the 'id, the 'ego' and the 'superego'.

In 1933, the Nazis publicly burnt a number of Freud's books. In 1938, shortly after the Nazis annexed Austria, Freud left Vienna for London with his wife and daughter Anna.

Freud had been diagnosed with cancer of the jaw in 1923, and underwent more than 30 operations. He died of cancer on 23 September 1939.

Reviews

[Justin Tate · Rating 4 out of 5]

Whew! A daunting classic with plenty of awkward moments, but absolutely worth reading. Bucketlist material, for sure. Special thanks to Michael Page who narrated the unabridged audio version. His narration is absolutely pitch-perfect, the total embodiment of an analytical psychologist. Without the audio I probably wouldn't have read it, and that would be a shame.

What I love most is the endless analysis. Yes, some of Freud's theories are pretty wild--and I'll get to that--but there's a lot to learn about the human condition, both in its sleeping and waking states. Freud analyzes every possible dream from so many angles it boggles the mind. But, being a constant dreamer, his theories kept me in rapt attention.

My dreams are often varying and multi-faceted. Freud talks about them all and many others. The examples he gives of dreams that manifest out of reality are particularly interesting. This happens to me often. I’ll dream an elaborate story, with characterization, rising plot, mystery and intrigue, and right at the climax, when the protagonist is about to get hit by a train, there's a real-world blaring sound. Only the real sound isn't a train, it happens to be my alarm clock.

How the hell is that possible? My dreaming state can plot itself out to the millisecond so that the climax coincides with my alarm ringing? It's miraculous, unexplainable. And yet, Freud explains it. Or tries to at least. Even after 600+ pages--or 21 hours on audio--there's room left for mystery, I think. And Freud himself says that two people can dream the exact same thing and it have completely different meanings based on context.

For example, falling. If you've dreamed of falling from a large height, it could be a bodily reaction to a foot hanging loose off the mattress. Or, surprise surprise, it could be about sex. According to Freud, a woman may manifest a dream of falling as a symbolic reflection of her unconscious feeling of being--or desiring to be--a "fallen woman."

Spoiler alert: Freud basically concludes that all of your dreams are about sex.

There's his expected theory on phallic symbolism, of course. If you dream about corn stalks or cucumbers, we all know what you're really dreaming about. But objects that pun with sexual objects are also in play. Such as the "fallen woman."

The most bizarre example Freud uses is dreaming of children. Because it was in vogue to refer to the male member as 'little man,' Freud concludes that dreaming of a child is often the subconscious using symbolism. And if you dream of beating the child? Well, obviously that must mean your subconscious is expressing a wish to masturbate.

Freud is a controversial figure because of ideas like these, but it would be loss to not recognize how many of this theories are crucial to understanding psychology. And for those who accuse him of being a sex-obsessed maniac, we should remember that all living things are sex-obsessed maniacs. From the trees who fill the spring air with their pollen, to the male black widow who gives up his life for the sake of biological need. And yes, humans too.

Whether or not you want to admit it, we're built to think like that, and Freud's continual return to sex comes across less like the cocaine-loving ramblings of a nympho, and more like someone who understands what makes a human tick.

At the very least, all of the passages about medicinal cocaine and sex symbolism makes this an infinitely more entertaining read than it might be otherwise.

Overall, I would easily mark this as a must-read classic. Where else can you find a thick textbook that's actually engaging? It will make you think, question yourself, and understand yourself. If nothing else, it's made me hyper aware of my dreams. I remember ALL OF THEM now. Instead of waking up and shaking them away, I'm immediately replaying them in my mind and thinking, "Oh God, what would Freud say about THAT?"

[Trevor · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a much more interesting book than I thought it might be. The nature of dreams is something that is hard not to find fascinating. The thing is that we spend quite a bit of time dreaming – not the third of our lives we spend sleeping, but enough time to make us wonder why we dream at all. It seems incomprehensible that our dreams would be completely meaningless. But then, they can be so bizarre it is hard to know just what they might mean.

Freud starts with a quick run through how dreams have been interpreted in the past – from Aristotle on. Aristotle is a good place to start, as he says we dream about things that have been left unresolved from the day – and this is a core idea that Freud also includes in his theory of dreams.

Essentially, Freud sees dreams as playing a key role in helping us to process stuff that happened during the day. But dreams are a truth that likes to hide. Their meaning covers itself in remarkable allusions and images that are often amusingly apt, but sometimes it is as if we are determined to hide the true meaning of our dreams even from ourselves.

Freud makes it clear that this will not be a book of off-the-shelf interpretations – ‘oh, you dreamt of a lion last night, that means you should have been born Leo and spent time chasing gazelle’. To Freud it is impossible to understand and interpret dreams from a list of standard symbols. This doesn’t mean that if you are going to interpret dreams you don’t have to know a lot about symbols and their common meanings – but this knowledge is never enough. Symbols develop their own meanings within the text that is the dream. Just as in Blake’s The Sick Rose the rose can be read to mean anything from nature, to the Christian Church, to female genitalia, so in dreams the interpretation is meaningful within the context of the dream and to the life of the dreamer. And the dream is relevant to the immediate life of the dreamer. It is generally a response to what happened that day – even if the imagery used may well refer back to the childhood of the dreamer so that the deeper significance is a life's work.

The other remarkable conclusion Freud draws is that dreams are wish fulfilments. Now, this seems anything but obvious. Sure, when we have dreams we are having sex with super-models it is pretty obvious that Freud is onto something. But these aren’t the only dreams he sees as being wish fulfilments. Even dreams where loved ones die are seen by Freud as being fundamentally the realisations of wishes – but again, the dream isn’t always as easy to interpret as it might initially seem and the wish may not be as easy to understand as might be immediately apparent from what happens in the dream. The fact we wake screaming and shaking from a dream may not mean there is no wish involved in the thing that terrifies us – although, I would have to say I don’t think he dealt with nightmares nearly as well as he ought to have.

It is here that Freud discusses the Oedipal Complex – how our first sexual attraction is toward the parent of the opposite sex to ourselves and therefore we desire to remove one parent from the scene so as to take their place. While we are children the full implications of this desire are obscure to us – but as we grow older the taboo associated with this desire helps suppress our recognition of these desires, or repress them, rather – but only from the conscious mind. The subconscious mind still remembers what we might prefer to forget and so uses these images, as the first images of our awakening desires, as potent images in our dreams. The meaning of the image may not be anything like that we want to kill our father and have sex with our mother – it might actually refer to an awakening of sexual interest in someone else we have only recently meet – but the dream uses this ‘primal’ image as something to help it make sense of our current world and desires, even if the image then goes on to confuse the hell out of us.

Time for a story. I once worked with a woman called Frances Nolan. She was really lovely, one of the nicest people I’ve ever worked with, but I didn’t really fancy her. I mean, she was pretty and incredibly nice, but she was quite a bit younger than me and I just wasn’t really all that interested in her in that way. But every morning I would be walking to the train station and when I got to a certain part of Church Street she would suddenly jump into my head as large as life. I was starting to think that I must have been starting to fall for her – it was the strangest feeling, and quite confusing. Until one day I realised that there is a shoe shop in Church Street that is called Frances Nolan Shoes – and the sign is huge and I would walk under it every day. I really struggle to believe I didn’t consciously notice this sign in all the time I had walked up that street and imagined I was falling for poor Frances.

This book is interesting as I had assumed it would be a much harder read than it turned out to be – I also thought it would be a much sillier book than it turned out too. It is extremely well written. I don’t think I agree entirely with Freud, but he makes a very strong case. My main problems with his theory have to do with Sherlock Holmes. Because that’s what a lot of this sounded like to me. Someone has a dream and Freud does the whole ‘Elementary, my dear Watson’ thing. It even gets to the stage where he says that sometimes things mean the opposite of what they seem to mean in the dream. When that is the case then any interpretation is basically about imposing ones preconceptions on the meaning of the symbols in the dream.

I tend to think that dreams probably don’t mean nearly as much as we like to think they do – but what they do do is throw up lots of random images, images which we try to make sense of and it is that ‘making of sense’ that says interesting things about us. And whether it is dream images or tarot cards or ink dots on paper – our making sense of random images says interesting things about us. But we should go gently into this stuff. We should go on tip-toes. Because stories have lives of their own and we are weaker than a good story and always will be.

I once read a book called Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain. I think in that book she says that lines have a momentum that is very hard to control – but controlling the momentum of lines is a large part of what drawing is about. Stories also have a momentum that is very hard to control. The narratives we tell about ourselves are one thing – the narrative we tell about our dreams are quite another.

Personally, I think I prefer Freudian readings of novels to Freudian readings of people – but I can certainly see why this book made such an impact. If the problem with the book is Freud playing Holmes, it is only a problem because he is so damn clever he gets away with it. I’m surprised I’m going to do this – I would never have thought I would have when I started reading - but I think I would recommend this book. It is a fascinating read, even if it has left me somewhat less than convinced.

[Agir(آگِر) · Rating 5 out of 5]

جمله ای از موریس مترلینگ درباره خواب هست که دقیقا خاطرم نیست ولی
:چنین مضمونی داشت
یک سوم زندگی ما در خواب می گذرد و ما از کجا مطمئن باشیم آنچه در خواب می بینیم حقیقی تر از بیداری نباشد؟



این کتاب را خواندم چون دنیای خواب برایم خیلی شگفت انگیز است و کنجکاو بودم بدانم این خواب ها از کجا می آیند و چطور است که گاهی در بعضی خواب ها، آینده خود را به ما نشان می دهد؟
سوال های ماورالطبیعه ایم حل نگردید ولی بجای ان با بُعد دیگری از خواب آشنا شدم؛یعنی فلسفه وجودی و جنبه روانشناسی اکثر خواب ها

خواب ها معمولا باقی مانده اتفاقات روز قبل هستند.خواب برای این است که کام های وازده را برآورده سازد تا روان انسان به آرامش برسد
یعنی علاوه بر اینکه ما از لحاظ بدنی خستگی در می کنیم از لحاظ روانی هم تخلیه می شویم
چگونگی تشکیل خواب را در آخرین قسمت ریویو آورده ام
اینکه چطور این آرزوها و افکار پنهانی به رویا تبدیل می شوند و چنین رمزآلود و گاها پر از اساطیر و... می شوند حیرت انگیز است
ادبیات و نقاشی و بیشتر هنرهای تجسمی و حتی خود سینما مطمئنا از خواب الگو گرفته اند
یادمه در کتابی خواندم مک کارتنی یکی از اعضای مهم گروه "بیتلز" آهنگ یا شعر ترانه معروف «دیروز» را در خواب دیده بود و روز بعد آن را نوشت
احتمالا شعر بوده چون طبق این کتاب و تجربیاتی که خود در خواب داشته ام، همه یا بیشتر خواب ها بصورت صامت هستند



:تعریف تعبیر خواب بصورت علمی
تعبیر خواب یعنی صورت ظاهر آن را به صورت باطن یعنی افکار پنهان تبدیل کنیم.یا به زبان دیگر آنچه را رویا بافته از هم جدا کنیم



:زبان خواب

بیشتر خواب ها زبانی نمادین دارند و این زبان گاهی ریشه ای هزاران ساله دارد که برای تعبیر آن باید شناختی از اسطوره ها داشت
آیا هیجان انگیز نیست که خوابی ببینی که در آن گاها زبان مشترکی با اجداد هزاران ساله ات داشته باشی؟

:نکاتی جالب در مورد زبان خواب و هم زبان کهن

زبان شناسان مشهور بر این عقیده اند که در کهن ترین زبان های بشر معانی متضاد مانند بیرون و درون، زبون و توانا، به یک صورت ادا می شده و کلمات اولیه دارای دو معنی بوده اند

در بعضی موارد وحدت رموز و اشارات از وحدت زبان وسیع تر است
بعضی علائم به طور عموم بین اشخاص دارای یک زبان و فرهنگ، مشترک است

:چند مثال از رموز خواب در اینجا می آورم

رمز «عبا» در خواب: ما معتقد بودیم عبا در خواب های زنان مرز مرد است و به او اشاره می کند
آقای رایک می گوید: داماد، نزد طوایف بیابانگرد، در جشن های قدیمی ازدواج، عروس را با یک پارچه بزرگ که عبا نامیده می شد می پوشاند و
«کلمات زیر را تکرار می کرد: «مگذار جز من کسی در آینده تو را بپوشاند



رمز پل : آقای فیرنزی در سال 1922-1921 آن را فاش کرد
پل در اصل نماینده عضو تناسلی مرد می باشد که در اثنای نزدیکی، پدر و مادر را به هم وصل می کند، ولی به زودی تبدیل و تحویل یافت و دارای معانی متعددی گردید که همه معانی جدید از همان معنای اصلی مشتق شده است
و چون عضو تناسلی مرد مسئول حقیقت تولید انسان از آب است، پس پل نماینده رهگذر یا موصل از آنجا (ماقبل ولادت- رحم مادر) به اینجا یا (زندگی) می باشد و چون بشر مرگ را بازگشت به رحم زن(بازگشت به آب) می داند پس رمز پل معنی چیزی که مرگ را در بر دارد پیدا می کند...اخیرا ممکن است پل از معنی اصل خود، بیشتر تجرید شود و بر معانی دورتری اطلاق گردد، ولی هر طوری که باشد نماینده انتقال یا هرگونه تغییر حالت می باشد

و همین است راز زنی که هنوز نتوانسته است بر رغبت «مرد شدن» خودش چیره شود
..و پل های کوتاهی که به لب خشکی سمت دیگر نرسیده زیاد به خواب می بیند



مقصود از امپراتور و امپراتریس و شاه و ملکه، پدر و مادر است.اطاق خواب به زن تعبیر می شود و غرض از درهای ورود و خروج مخرج های طبیعی بدن است
علامات و اشاراتی که در رویا به کار می رود اغلب برای پنهان کردن اشخاص یا اعضا بدن یا اعمالی است که مربوط به شهوت رانی می شود.مقصود از اسلحه تیز و اشیا دراز و سفت و تنه درخت و عصا ، آلت رجولیت است و از گنجه و جعبه و درشکه و بخاری باید به عضو زن پی برد

:مثالی از خواب دهشت آور یک دوشیزه که رموز جالبی در آن نهفته است


نکته مهم: خواب همواره روابط زمانی را به روابط مکانی تبدیل می کند

یکی از خواب های خیلی جالب که قبلا در نت آنرا بصورت معما خوانده بودم
کمی خواب را تغییر و حالتی جنایی به آن داده بودند که اگر جواب درست میدادی برچسب قاتل بالفطره را بهت می چسباندند






یک روانکاو به تنهایی نمی تواند خوابی را به وسیله رموز و نمادها تعبیر کند مگر به کمک شخصی که خواب دیده و تداعیاتی که این شخص از خواب خود دارد

همه خواب ها را فقط تا حدی می توان شناخت و تعبیر کرد
در هر خوابی لاقل به یک نقطه می رسیم که از آن فراتر نتوانیم رفت. مثل اینکه این نقطه ناف خواب است و آن را به ناشناختنی وصل می کند

:خواب و ادبیات

خواب در ادبیات هم جایگاه خاصی دارد و نویسندگان قدیمی و جدید از آن استفاده های زیادی می کنند.مثلا در کتاب «بار هستی» میلان کوندرا، خواب های ترزا بخش مهمی از کتاب هستند.حالا چقدر قبل و بعد از فروید درست تعبیر شده اند را نمی دانم
اما خود فروید می گوید:اشتباهات و تناقضی که در ادبیات راجع به خواب دیده می شود از خطای نویسندگان است که اغلب نمی دانند خواب دارای خیالاتی است باطنی و باید آن را به وسیله ی تحلیل از اصل خواب بیرون کشید

:نتایج


زیگموند فروید برای اثبات نظریه هاش درباره خواب بیشتر با پزشکان جسمی اختلاف نظر داشت تا عامه مردم
این پزشکان همانطور که در استاتوس آوردم روانکاوی را علم نمی دانستند و به خواب هم دیدگاهی مادی گرایانه داشتند

پزشکانی به خلاف فلاسفه، رویا را عمل روحی نمی دانند و برآنند که صور خواب تنها مولود تحریکات جسم و حواس است که از عالم بیرون و یا از اختلاج اعضا درون به خفته می رسد

:اما خود فروید دو نتیجه مهم از تحقیقاتش میگرد
خواب برآورده شدن آرزو است که اغلب خواب های کودکان به وضوح این را اثبات می کند
خواب اشخاص بزرگسال عموما ناشی از امیال شهوانی است

با استفاده از خواب می توان به ریشه بیماری های روانی دست یافت.در روانکاوی، خواب نقش خیلی مهمی دارد همانطور که خیالات غیرارادی دارند

خیالات غیرارادی آن خیالات ناخوانده و پریشانی است که رشته ی فکر را هر دم پاره می کند، همان است که صاحب خیال آنرا پوچ و بی معنی می پندارد

چون هم خواب و هم این خیالات برخاسته از درون آدمی است و می تواند قسمتی از وجود ما را که حتی برای ما ناشناخته است بما بنمایاند

فروید در مورد سانسور غیرآگاهانه هم توضیحات جالبی دارد که باورمان شاید
:نشود که بدون آنکه بدانیم افکاری را درونمان سانسور می نماییم

این حالت خاص روحی را پس رانی می نامم. این حالت در واقع حس تنفری است که نسبت به افکاری در شخص تولید می شود


نحوه تفکر ما و افکار پس رانده و چگونگی بوجود آمدن خواب از نظر فروید که
:یکی از جالب ترین قسمت های کتاب است

ما عقیده داریم که روح انسان برای ایجاد فکر، دو قوه دارد. قوه دوم دارای این مزیت است که هرچه را می سازد، وجدان بی درنگ درک می کند لکن ساخته ی قوه ی اولی نامدرک مانده و یا به وسیله قوه ی دومی به وجدان می رسد

در سرحد این دو قوه آنجا که قوه ی اولی به قوه ی دومی می پیوندند یک غربال نقادی وجود دارد که افکار باید از آن بگذرد. آنچه نباید وارد وجدان شود از غربال نمی گذرد و به جا می ماند. افکار باقیمانده را که غربال نقادی وا می زند،(افکار پس رانده) می نامیم. ولی در مواقع خاصی در ضمن خواب، عمل نقادی سست شده فعالیت دو قوه از راه عادی منحرف می شوند و قسمتی از افکار پس رانده خود را به وجدان می رساند

بنابراین، چون عمل نقادی هرچند سست بشوند ناچار تغییر صورت داده چهره ی زشت خود را به طوری بپوشانند. بنابراین آنچه وارد وجدان می شود حاصل سازش و مصالحه ای که بین تقاضاهای مخالف دو قوه صورت می گیرد

باید دانست عمل پس رانی و سستی نقادی و مصالحه نه تنها در خواب بلکه در هر توع فعالیت روحی محسوس است

وقتی خواب به بیداری تبدیل شد انتقاد به کار خود پرداخته آنچه را در مدت ناتوانی پذیرفته بود از خود می راند. اینکه رویا به سرعت فراموش می شود دلیل واضح و مثبتی بر این نظریه است. به اضافه در اثر تجربه می دانیم که هنگام حکایت کردن خواب یا تجزیه ی آن ممکن است نکته یی که به کلی فراموش شده بود به خاطر بیاید و اتفاقا آن نکته بهترین و نزدیک ترین وسیله فهم مقصود خواب واقع می شود و شاید هم به همین جهت در نتیجه عمل انتقاد، آن نکته به فراموشی سپرده شده است


حتی وقتی به خواب عمیق فرو رفته ایم یک مقدار توجه در ما بیدار است تا اگر لازم و صلاح باشد ما را از خواب بیدار کند. به قول «بورداخ» فیزیولوژیست معروف، هرکس از آنچه بیشتر مایه ی تعلق او است زودتر متاثر شده بیدار می شود، چنانکه مادر از گریه ی کودک و آسیابان از توقف سنگ آسیا و اغلب اشخاص از شنیدن اسم خود آسان بیدار می شوند
وقتی لحظه آخر پیش از بیدار شدن، در خواب صدا و هیاهو باشد برای این است که صدای خارج در رویا به صورت دیگری ترجمه شده خواب را قطع نکند و چند لحظه دیگر هم به خفته مجال استراحت بدهد

[Alok Mishra · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have read various editions of various books claiming to interpret the dreams we see while we are unconscious or subconscious. However, the book by Freud is different. Being a psychologist and a famous one, his interpretations are mostly based on popular beliefs, culture and analysis. In the Indian context, much of it cannot be exemplified. Still, the book is fine and noteworthy even today.

[Warwick · Rating 3 out of 5]

I dreamt that I had written a huge modern rewrite of Moby-Dick, except instead of a whale they were hunting a badger. It was full of gothic scenes of Ahab staring moodily into some light woodland, reminiscing about how the white beast had bitten his foot once, and how he would ultimately ‘earth the hated brock in his dank and stinking sett, and finish him utterly’. Instead of the Pequod, Ahab and the narrator cycled through the forest on a tandem bicycle, studying tracks and peering through the shrubs. Every now and then, one of them would point through the branches and shout, ‘Lo! The white badger!’, and they would pedal off.

In my mind this was a serious literary project. Unfortunately I have never finished Moby-Dick, and so the book just devolved into chapters full of interminable facts about badger biology, lifestyle and cultural history, and the foundational role they play in the mythology of countless woodland societies (which is not true). I remember copying out a quote from King Lear where someone is said to be ‘like unto the brindl'd baddger’, but sadly upon waking I have discovered that this line does not exist. On the other hand, I also remember repeatedly using the adjective ‘meline’ which does, in fact, exist and is not a word I knew that I knew.

If anyone can interpret this for me, I am all ears. In the meantime, if you'll excuse me I now have 200,000 words to write about badger-hunting.

(Aug 2018)

Another strange dream, also animal related. I was staying in an old house in the countryside around Lago Maggiore. It was a big crumbling mansion, surrounded by marshes and woodland like something from Edgar Allen Poe. It was twilight. In a dark creek nearby, we found a shark and caught it in a net. It was explained to me that this was a very rare kind of shark that was only found in the swampland of this area, and that it was called Mercer's cat-shark. We tipped it out onto the ground. It had a small body and a wide snout, and was completely covered in short dark fur.

(Mar 2020)

[Glenn Russell · Rating 5 out of 5]

I enjoyed reading Freud’s book. When he speaks about dreams and their interpretation, I am reminded of a microfiction I had published years ago where the editor told me it was the weirdest story he has ever read and that a Freudian psychoanalyst would have a field day interpreting. Here it is below. If anyone would care to offer an interpretation according to Freud or any other school of psychoanalysis, I'm sure you could have some fun.

The Roof Dancer

Sidney and Sam, identical twins, crackerjack roofers, started work up on a roof one sultry July morning when Sam tripped on a piece of tar at the roof’s peak and slid down head first. He would have plunged straight to the ground if Sidney hadn’t reached over at the last moment and snatched him by his boots.

Hanging over the side upside-down, Sam had a view through a second floor bedroom window. The lady of the house was completely naked. Her ample rear end was bobbing and swinging to a polka playing on an enormous ancient phonograph.

Sidney yanked Sam back up to the roof but Sam became so excited in the process, he ejaculated his semen seed. By the time the seed popped out of the bottom of his dungarees, rolled off the roof and landed in the yard, it was the size of a cantaloupe.

From all corners of the yard kids skipped over and began frolicking with the seed. Its round contour grew to the size of a watermelon in their hands.

Sam stared down at the kids. He began a high-step gleeful dance, part mazurka, part gavotte, part rumba, part hornpipe right there on the roof, bottom to top, edge to edge, twirling like some enchanted wood nymph, his pot belly jiggling in pure ecstasy.

It wasn’t long before the man of the house, a bald, mustachioed Mr. Verea, made his way up the ladder. “What’s all this racket I’m hearing?” he asked, scanning the roof.

Sam pirouetted daintily at the peak, doffing his baseball cap. Mr. Verea grabbed Sidney by the suspenders and yelled, “Do you guys think I hired you to put a new roof on my house or perform ballet?”

“Yes, sir, right away, sir,” Sidney stammered, beads of sweat pouring off his forehead and bulbous nose.

Mr. Vera pushed Sidney rudely. “Now, I say, do it now!”

Sidney wobbled backwards, nearly toppling over the edge but regained his balance and shoved Mr. Verea back. A rapid-fire shoving match ensued along the entire length of the roof. At the same time Sam fluttered down on tiptoe, scooped up an armful of shingles and started putting them in place.

A fully-dressed Mrs. Verea made her appearance at the head of the ladder. “Get back down here,” she railed at her husband. “Let those men finish their work.”

“Nobody is going to push me on my own roof,” he replied.

“I say come down,” insisted Mrs. Verea.

“Come down yourself,” said Mr. Verea.

Stepping up from the ladder to the roof Mrs. Verea kicked her husband in the pants. He stopped shoving Sidney, turned around and started shoving her, whereupon she too started shoving him furiously.

Sidney fanned himself with his baseball cap and looked over at his brother – just now, between acrobatic leaps of a saltarello, Sam placed the last of the shingles on the tar.

As if he were at the court of Louis XIV, Sidney curtsied gracefully, then pointed to the ladder before climbing down himself. Sam followed, hips swinging but fell between the rungs. There was nothing for Sidney to do but guide the ladder, with his brother stuck in it, to the van.

The kids approached; they held the distended seed, the shape and length of a garden hose now: translucent with flecks of gold, sparkling, radiating light in their hands. When Sam jiggled and kicked down the driveway, the kids shook the magnificent seed, each shake casting out fine gold dust that turned to streams of water when it touched the earth.

[لونا · Rating 4 out of 5]

لست من الأشخاص المهووسين بتفسير أحلامهم، لطالما كان الحلم بالنسبة لي مجرد ظاهرة نفسية صحيَّة وكفى، ولا تستدعي مني الوقوف عندها، ولهذا قرأت هذا كتاب بنيَّة "للعلم فقط بمحتواه" نظراً لشهرته، لكني بعد أن انتهيت منه اعترف أني استمتعت كثيراً بمحتواه التي ترك أثراً في نفسي على عكس مما توقعت تماماً

هذا الكتاب يعتبر أشهر ما كتب "سيجموند فرويد" الذي قال عن كتابه :- ( إنه يحوي أثمن الكشوف التي شاء حسن الطالع أن تكون من نصيبي؛ فمثل هذا الحدس لا يأتي العمر مرتين) ..

يستهل "فرويد" كتابه بذكر نظريات الأحلام والملخص الذي خرجت به هو أن الحلم أشبه بفترة جنون مؤقتة يعيشها الإنسان، ويفعل بها ما يريد لأن الرقابة وملكة النقد الحاضرتان في اليقظة معدومتان في الحلم .. .. وأن الحلم إما أن يكون مصدره حسي من خارج أو داخل الجسم، أو مصدر عضوي باطني ، أو آثار نفسية خالصة .. ..وأن الحلم قد يكون نبوءة وكشف للمستقبل .. .. يُطيل "فرويد" في المقدمة ليكون القارئ على علم بالنظريات المطروحة وليستعد لطرحه الجديد والمختلف كلياً

يقول "فرويد" أن الأحلام ليست بالتفاهة التي نعتقد ولا تشتغل بتوافه الأمور ومهما كان الحلم بريئاً فإنه عكس ذلك تماماً لو تجشم المرء عناء تحليله

الأحلام تنشأ من "منطقة اللاشعور" وتخضع لعملية تكثيف مركزة .. .. ولهذا لمعرفة اللاشعور في الحياة النفسية للأشخاص فإن تفسير الأحلام يعتبر أحد الطرق الفعَّالة

الحلم تحقيق "لرغبة مكبوته" غالباً من مرحلة الطفولة، ولكنه لا يكون حلم صريح، بل غالباً ما يشوبها التشويه


أما سبب هذا التشويه هو "الرقابة" .. نعم الرقابة التي قال من سبقه من العلماء أنها غير موجودة فإن "فرويد" يقول هي سبب التشويه الذي يحدث لأحلامنا .. .. فالرقابة لا تختفي أثناء النوم بل تقل حدَّتها وعندما نستيقظ فإنها تستعيد قوتها وهو السبب الرئيسي لنسيان أغلب أحلامنا

ومادة الحلم التصويرية (التي تتحول بها الأفكار إلى صور) أساسها المشاهد الثانوية التافه التي لا تلفت انتباهنا أثناء يقظتنا وليست الأحداث الجوهرية، ومرحلة الطفولة إحدى المصادر الرئيسية لمادة الحلم التي يحدث لها تشويه كبير ولا تأتي صريحة كما قلنا سابقاً بسبب الرقابة التي تصل إلى حدود اللعب بالألفاظ والجناس اللغوي والمعنوي المتقن والرمزية العالية .. .. ولتفسير الحلم فإن أحداث اليوم السابق لها أهمية كبيرة فالحلم يستغل هذه الأحداث ليلمح للرغبات التي أغلبها تعتمد على خبرات الطفولة

أما بالنسبة لكون الأحلام أساسها مصدر تنبيهي جسدي أحيانا فيقول "فرويد" عكس ذلك .. .. فيمكن استغلال المنبهات الجسدية فقط إذا كانت تخدم الحلم في تحقيق الرغبة .. .. ويعرض هنا ظاهرة وجدتها غريبة جداً وهي "ظاهرة المراجعة الثانوية" التي يشرح فيها ن بعض الأحلام جاهزة في منطقة اللاشعور وتنتظر فقط المنبه الخارجي لتنطلق (مثل أن يحلم شخص بالإعدام بقطع رأسه بالمقصلة وعندما يستيقظ يجد لوحاً من السرير سقط على رقبته) فسقوط اللوح استغله الحلم للخروج، وخاصية التكثيف الشديد التي يتميز بها الحلم هي سبب عدم إدراكنا لهذه الظاهرة

أما كون الأحلام نبؤه للمستقبل فهو شيء لا يوافق عليه "فرويد" ويقول إن الأحلام تحيطنا علماً بالماضي، فالحلم فرع من الماضي بكل معنى من المعاني .. .. ويسلك بنا جهة المستقبل فقط بكونه عمل على تحقيق رغبات مكبوتة

يفرد "فرويد" جزءاً كبيراً في الكتاب بالأساس الجنسي لأغلب الأحلام بكونها أكثر الرغبات المكبوتة (كلما زاد المرء اشتغالا بحل مشكلة الأحلام زاد استعداده للتسليم بأن غالبية أحلام الراشدين تعالج مادة جنسية وتعرب عن رغبات عشقيه .......... فواجبنا عند تفسير الحلم ألا ننسى أبداً هذه القيمة " فما من غريزة لاقت منذ الطفولة مثل الكبت الذي لاقته الغريزة الجنسية") ..

عيب الكتاب كثرة الهوامش التوضيحية أسفل الصفحات كانت مزعجه جداً بالنسبة لي (خصوصاً أني مُبتليَّه بقراءة نسخة إلكترونية) فأنا من الأشخاص الذين يتشتت انتباههم بكثرة الهوامش على الرغم من هدفها التوضيحي، فكان تجاهل أغلبها الحل الأنسب لي

كتاب دسِم (بكل ما تحمله الكلمة من معنى) .. .. انصح بقراءته على دفعات لغير المختصين فكل خلية عصبية في الدماغ سوف تستنفر أثناء القراءة .. .. ولمن يريد أخذ فكره مختصره عن الكتاب دون الغوص فيه يمكنه قراءة النسخة المختصرة التي ترجمها الدكتور نظمي لوقا في 192 صفحة (لم أقرأها للأمانة) عوضاً عن 662 صفحة.. ..ولكني أنصح بخوض تجربة قراءة هذا الكتاب كاملاً .. .. أيضاً الترجمة كانت متقنة "لدرجة الإزعاج" بالنسبة لي، وساهمت في زيادة الكتاب "دسامةً" .. .. كان من الممكن أن تكون أقل شدَّة، لكن ربما ثِقل الكتاب يستوجب هذا الإتقان

ملاحظة أخيرة: "فرويد" يقوم بتفسير ( الأصح "تحليل") الأحلام ضمن جلسات طويلة جداً يبدل فيها مجهود كبير ليصل لنتيجة وهو المتَّضح من خلال قراءة هذا الكتاب .. .. لكم أتمنى أن أرى ردة فعلة على من يقومون بتفسير الأحلام من خلال مكالمة هاتفية لا تتجاوز الدقائق

[Luís · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Interpretation of Dreams is the classic text on dream analysis and interpretation. Freud introduced many vital concepts that would later become central to the theory of psychoanalysis. The book also emphasizes the role of the unconscious mind, which is one of the underlying principles of Freudian psychology.

[Eghbal]

بسمه تعالی
اینجانب اقبال از این پس تعهد میدهم که فروید نخوانم چون نه میتوانم بخوانم و نه میتوانم بفهمم و ترکیب این دو باهم واویلاست
عااااااح افسوس بر آن کالری های ارزشمند و گرانبها که در تلاش ادراک این کتاب سوزانده و هدرش دادم :///

[Parmida R. A. · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have to admit that I was wrong about Freud. He was indeed a genius. His approach towards dreams and subconsciousness stunned me. He studied dreams with an incredible delicacy, and much like a surgeon, he dissects parts of dreams and suggests his interpretations of them.

In Freud’s opinion, dreams represent our desires and pains. For him, the dream is like a stage with a mysterious and symbolic show full of metaphors, and by decoding the meaning behind it, one can unravel the secrets, desires, and pains. Dreams, in Freud's view, are formed as the result of two mental processes. The first process involves unconscious forces that construct a wish expressed by the dream, and the second is the process of censorship that forcibly distorts the expression of the wish. In Freud's view, all dreams are forms of wish fulfillment.
He dissected many dreams and nightmares to prove his idea.

I think it is helpful to add my strange experience here:
I’ve been thinking about Freud’s theory and thought, “I should examine his idea myself.”
That night, I dreamed my brother had an exam the day after—which he really had—and I was angry over him for not waking up. In the dream, my efforts were in vain, and he insisted on sleeping.
After waking up, I thought that obviously, my hidden desire couldn’t be my brother missing his exam, but after a while, I discovered the meaning. That night before going to sleep, my mother had asked me when I would like to wake up, and I answered, “when my brother wakes up.”
My dream can be proof of Freud’s opinion: my hidden desire was not to wake up early, so I dreamed my brother not waking up for his exam: to fulfill my hidden wish of waking up late the following day.

Freud claimed that every dream has a connection point with an experience of the previous day. The connection may be minor, as the dream content can be selected from any part of the dreamer's life.
Freud believed that dreams were picture puzzles, and though they may appear nonsensical and worthless on the surface, through the process of interpretation they can form a "poetical phrase of the greatest beauty and significance.”

I believe Freud had an innovative approach towards dreams, and since he found dreams a gate to subconsciousness, I think in the future I have to come back to this book and reread it thoroughly with other works of Freud. I'm also curious to study Jung's thoughts as well. I hope reading theories and thinking about them help me find a notion on mind, dreams, psychoanalysis, and subconsciousness.

P.S.: However, I still believe Freud over-sexualized dreams and everything, and I remain skeptical about these statements.

[Vasilii · Rating 4 out of 5]

I can now interpret every dream. (Just kidding.)

If you want your dreams to remain magical and mysterious, do not read this book. Now, even while I’m dreaming, I catch myself thinking: “This whole thing is just a system of coherent associations that I shouldn’t take literally. These are encoded representations of my desires.” So when some creature is chasing me in a dream, instead of running, I’m like: “You’re just a puzzle made of my memories, ideas, and suppressed wants. Let me decode you first, and then you can kill me.”

Jokes aside, time to get serious. When you read a book, you usually assume the author is at least somewhat intelligent, or at worst, just a regular thinker. Well, Freud isn’t just smart—he’s a genius. Of course, I always knew he was considered the father of modern psychology, but after reading this, I’m convinced he’s one of the greatest minds of all time. (I think I’m in love. :D)

The reason for this bold claim is also the book’s biggest flaw—most of Freud’s dream interpretations only work if you’re as intelligent as he was. You need to trace a massive chain of logical connections to decode a dream properly. At some point, I even started wondering if he was just making things up—not in the sense that he didn’t dream these things, but that he might be retroactively constructing events that fit his interpretations. But since he applied the same method to his patients, I doubt that’s the case.

That said, he does use some convenient arguments to keep his main idea intact—namely, that dreams always express our desires. For instance, he claims that even a fleeting wish, present for just one second, can make its way into our dreams. Even more amusing is his explanation that if a dream seems completely nonsensical, it might be because our desire was for it to have no meaning (wtf).

Despite that, the cases he presents are impressively well-analyzed. His breakdown of recurring dream symbols was also particularly well done—I even tested it myself.

In conclusion: This book isn’t that practical, because applying its concepts requires an insane level of intelligence. But even so, it’s absolutely fascinating. 🫶

[Alexia · Rating 2 out of 5]

Written with scientific denseness, but lacks scientific rigor or clarity. Can be tedious, vague and confusing. Freud will say he's going to do something (like not use personal examples) only to forget he said that and do it anyway. Or he'll acknowledge the flaw with his approach and then do nothing to correct it (which is better than not admitting it, I guess). For example, he uses his patients, "neurotics", for analysis and comments on how how that makes his conclusions not drawn from a representative sample. But that comment is where it stops, there's no correction or real analysis on how that impacted his conclusions.
Or he'll start out with a clear sentence and then explain it until it descends into an illogical jumble. Or he'll refer to something not obvious as something obvious. Or he'll say there's numerous instances of something and then not list them. I could go on. He gives too many examples, belabors the points he does end up making, references confusing German word play...
I'm not going to make the same mistake as Frued. I'm going to stop talking once my point is made. And I think it's made.

[Owlseyes · Rating 4 out of 5]

A major book (of 1900) as one of the possible approaches to the world of dreams. Freud starts with Aristotle (and the demoniac view); then moves to the (biblical) approach viewing dreams as "divine inspiration".



Next, he proceeds with a very exhaustive sample of dreams of his own, of historical characters (Napoleon I, Xerxes....) or from his patients (or friends) to illustrate/prove his point: dreams are the fulfillment of (unconscious) desires. Though "absurd" they may look, they are meaningful, they can be interpreted.

This absurdity is due to unconscious mechanisms which disguise the true meaning of the dream, namely, via "displacement" and "condensation". Our language is also an obstacle: due to its inaccuracy. Yet language is paramount for the interpretation démarche. (And Freud was good at it).


(Tom Paine's nightly pest)

It's a pity he ends the last paragraph* of the book considering the value of dreams regarding the future (should have written: the prophetic aspect) concluding: "that we cannot consider". Curiously, he took some lines on this woman telling his mother about how a "great man" he would become; he speculated about a "minister" [job]... .


('The Interpretation of Dreams' by Rod Moss)

The fact is that this "wish-fulfillment" approach proved not to be totally true. With the great war (1914-1918), Freud had patients/soldiers who suffered from recurrent dreams /war-traumas...and he concluded later on, that these types of dreams [nightmares!] had no relation to the Eros impulse, rather to Thanatos: a destructive force/drive operating within the psyche. So he made some changes on his model of the psyche.


(Hypnos and Thanatos: Sleep and His Half-Brother Death, by John William Waterhouse, 1874)



Today [15th of June] I was listening to someone** speaking about dreams of the "USA in flames...and riots in the streets". Those dreams happened to people before the 2012 Obama election. They perceived a link between the re-election and the feared "upcoming events". Surely, those were dreams of the future; no pleasure-principle operating.

I'm glad they didn't "materialize".

UPDATE: I would be glad to hear of any help (interpretation) on Chief Golden Light Eagle's dream about Obama:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sywLXE...

*"And how about the value of the dream for a knowledge of the future? That, of course we cannot consider. One feels inclined to substitute:”for a knowledge of the past”. For the dream originates from the past in every sense. To be sure the ancient belief that the dream reveals the future is not entirely devoid of truth. By representing a wish as fulfilled the dream leads us into the future; BUT THIS FUTURE, TAKEN BY THE DREAMER AS PRESENT, HAS BEEN FORMED INTO THE LIKENESS OF THAT PAST BY INDESTRUCTIBLE WISH”.

**http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1zZSJ7...

UPDATE: I promise I will post any dream related to the re-election of Biden or Trump, in 2024. nightmare, would be more appropriate

[Jon Nakapalau · Rating 3 out of 5]

All my friends who were psychology majors told me to read this book. Did not understand everything, but I was happy to get this book off my list of influential books that influenced psychology. there was so much here that I have put this book on my 'reread' list; one day I will have to come back and see if I can understand a little more.

[Jan-Maat]

Ok.

I had it in my mind to return to Freud, who I find very enjoyable and interesting to read. I had tead this before, well maybe I had read this before, I think I have told a similar story about a couple of other books that I have reviewed on Goodreads, but anyhow when I reached page 552 ( out of 607 pages of text in this edition) I found an old train ticket which I would have been using as a bookmark. So it is quite possible that I read up to that point and then stopped for some reason, Freudian or otherwise.

Before going further I must acknowledge that two Goodreads friends have taught me that Freud wasn't a particularly nice man. MihaElla that when Freud escaped Vienna that he did not help his sisters to leave the country; and Katia N that he was a patrichal and demanding husband. All the same I enjoy reading his writing fir two reasons in particular.

Firstly, while on the one hand he is an Enlightenment figure, in that he believes that the world and people can be understood through the application of human reason. The world may appear random and crazy, but the thoughtful person, with application and science can explain it. But what does hisapplied reason show us? Only that beneath the rational surface of his society, the reality is anything but rational, and to make it worse (or maybe better for us psychologically) we are unconscious of our drives towards self-destruction or subordination, while being superbly capable of providing reasonable and rational explanations for this.

Secondly, for me, Freud reads people and society as we might read a novel; you might convincingly argue that I have phrased this back to front. I think I read somewhere that somebody put it to Arthur Schnitzler that his fiction was inspired by Freud's ideas to which he angrily replied that he and writers like him had those ideas long before the likes of Freud had got off the train from Moravia, and on the contrary, Freud was inspired by them.

Something not really relevent to the Interpretation of Dreams but which as a confirmed optimist which I am because I certain that things can always get worse I also appreciate, is Freud's social pessimism as seen in civilisation and its discontents and that pleases me enormously.

This book is a bit odd because Freud continued to revise and reprint it over several decades, he even encorpriates responses to earlier editions in later ones so the text becomes a little circular, claiming that work inspired by it validates the original thesis. Parts read very much like the psychopathology of everyday life, publish a couple of years before the first edition of the interpretation of dreams, other section feel weighed down by his slightly later theoretical structures, leaving those to one side his original discussion of the various types of dreams of a healthy person seems fairly constrained, even unremarkable.

What stood out for me though was, as in "psychopathology" was his interest in word play and cultural references. The unconscious for Freud, apparently has a sense of humour and a good all round literary education. Only one dream discussed by him is from a working class woman. Despite this, Freud , I guess managed to articulate and publish something that was resonant to many readers, even beyond the German linguistic frontiers, possibly because what he had to say about the unconscious and how itvreveals itself intuitively made sense to readers of fiction, particularly those who had read the more pyschological fiction of the nineteenth century, or works which were symbolist, or drew on the structures and patterns of folk or fairy tales.

I have a couple more books by Freud to get to on my shelves, if I will read them this year or not perhaps only an old train ticket could say.

[Sidharth Vardhan · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you are someone from East reading Freud or Jung for the first time, one of the things you will notice is how much culturally defined their assumptions are.

Freud also never stops to think that most of the dreams he is studying are from patients of neurosis. Freud's approach seems to be also limited by strong self-confirmatory bias in several other ways. Moreover, they are fail-proof because everything that might disprove them is super-ego suppressing it. All dreams are wish-fulfillment and if you had a dream about a wish you don't recognize, it is a wish you are suppressing. You just can't disprove such a theory.

Moreover, it is easy to see sexual symbolism in almost anything. Flowers, locks, keys, horses, etc. He never stops to think that some people's subconscious may not as pervert as that of his (or mine). A lot of things are either circular or straight, Freud will conclude seeing any such things in dreams is an allusion to some suppressed instinct because of similarity of tools involved.

Still, it is an interesting read - particularly when it is making simple observations rather than giving theories to explain those observations. And you can always imagine how amusing his therapy sessions must have been. A teenager comes to him all depressed and tells a dream about how he was swimming and he could go like, "so it seems to me you are jerking off a lot, right? right?"

There is a certain kind of courage needed to speak your truth when you know speaking it will only get you universal criticism. Freud definitely had that courage.

[Mohadese saffari · Rating 4 out of 5]

«فروید»
اولین و بهترین اسمی که روانشناسی رو برام معنی میکرد.
تا قبل از اینکه بخوام تو رشته روانشناسی تحصیل کنم اسمی از فروید نشنیده بودم.
ترم اول دانشگاه بیشتر درس ها عمومی بودن و استادا خیلی کم در مورد مکتب های روانشناسی صحبت میکردن.
وقتی واحدهایی مثل فلسفه‌ی علم روانشناسی، مباحث اساسی در روانشناسی و... رو بهمون درس میدادن و با صاحب نظرای روانشناسی آشنایی پیدا کردم، به این نتیجه رسیدم که روانشناسی یعنی: فروید.
یک روانشناس خوب باید مثل فروید گذشته نگر باشه و به غریزه‌ی جنسی و پرخاشگری توجه کنه.
فروید برام خلاصه میشد به کتابای درسی دانشگاهی.
ولی وقتی فهمیدم که نه! فروید کتاب های دیگه‌ای هم داره، خیلی به وجد اومدم و ترغیب شدم که برم به‌سمت خوندن کتاب هایی که خود فروید نوشته. برم سراغ اصل جنس!
خب برای منی که اهل مطالعه نبودم خوندن کتابای فروید یه‌کم سخت بود ولی سختی‌هاش رو به جون خریدم و شروع کردم.
مشتاقانه و مصمم شروع کردم به خوندن کتاب «آینده‌ی یک پندار» با ترجمه‌ی هاشم رضی. وقتی این کتاب رو میخوندم متوجه این میشدم که چقدر ساده بودم و ناآگاه که بدون فکر کردن یک سری عقاید رو بدون چون و چرا پذیرفته بودم و درک این حقیقت برام سخت بود. گاهی میشد که یک ماه کتاب رو کنار میذاشتم چون نمیتونستم با حقیقت کنار بیام. و وقتی دوباره برمیگشتم به سمت کتاب که فکر می‌کردم تونستم حقیقت رو بپذیرم. برای همین خوندن کتاب های فروید مدت ها طول کشید. فکر کنم کتاب آینده یک پندار رو نزدیک ۳ماه طول کشید خوندم!!!
مطمئناً دیگه اون آدم قبلی نبودم، دیدم نسبت به همه چیز عوض شده بود، بیشتر مشتاق دونستن شده بودم، بیشتر دوست داشتم با حقیقت رو به رو بشم پس کتاب بعدی فروید«تفسیر خواب» با ترجمه‌ی شیوا رویگریان رو شروع کردم به خوندن.
ترجمه کتاب خیلی خوب اما دایره لغات من ضعیف!
پس مجبور بودم وقتی کتاب رو میخونم یک فرهنگ لغت جلوم باز باشه، این مسأله، کارم رو یکم سخت میکرد ولی باعث نمیشد که دست از خوندن بکشم.
مطالب هر دو کتاب به شدت جذاب وعمیق بودند و در طول خوندن کتاب ها یادداشت برداری میکردم.
*
کتاب «آینده‌ی یک پندار» و«تفسیر خواب» کتاب هایی سخت اما سازنده هستن.
الان در دوران کارشناسی ارشد، نظریه های روانشناسی برام کامل تر شدن و جزئیات بیشتری ازشون میدونم. دیگه اون دید تک بعدی رو ندارم که اوایل تحصیلم داشتم. و این رو مدیون خوندن کتاب های فروید و آشنا شدن با دیدگاه‌های فروید هستم.
فروید و دیدگاهش برام خیلی با ارزشه و سعی میکنم در کنار داشتن دیدی فرویدی نسبت به دیدگاه‌های دیگه هم آگاهی پیدا کنم.
تک بعدی نگاه کردن در هیچ زمینه ای خوب نیست.

[Ivana Books Are Magic · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Interpretation of Dreams deals mostly with what the title would imply; it is an examination of the dream world according to Freud, one might say. Freud uses the subject of dreams as a base to build on, using dream analysis and interpretation as tools for his (at the time developing) psychoanalytical theory. It could be said that this is the book in which the author introduces his views and theory related to the unconscious mind. In this book, Freud often uses real-life anecdotes and events to discuss his dream theory. For me personally, the book was surprisingly easy to read. I quite enjoyed the anecdotes and was pleasantly surprised by the warmness (I cannot think of a better term) of some of Freud's more personal remarks.

I know I'm supposed to say something really profound after finishing this book. It should probably be something about the nature or psychoanalysis or the important part Freud had played in the development of modern thought, but I just don't feel like going there. Instead I'll just say that what I liked most about this book was Freud's playfulness and curiosity of his mind. His playfulness that in some sense resembles one of a child. I mean that as a complement. Even when I don't agree with what he writes, I like reading him. Freud was definitely ahead of his time in many ways.

Znam da bih trebala reći nešto dubokoumno, ali najviše od svega meni je Freud jednostavno simpatičan. Sviđa mi se kako piše, sviđa mi se kako razmišlja, a najviše od svega kod njega mi se sviđa ta nekakva radoznalost sa kojoj gleda na svijet, nešto je gotovo dječje i zaigrano u njegovim teorijama. Zato neću reći ništa o tome kako je on jako bitan za modenu misao, utemeljitelj psihoanalize i što ja znam što sve ne, to ionako svi znaju. Zato ću reći da me ugodno iznenadila toplina u nekim Freudovim opaskama osobnije prirode i jednostavan način pisanja. Doista mi se svidjela ova knjiga.

[Ghada · Rating 3 out of 5]

مبدئياً الكتاب نسخه ملخصه و مختصره ... سهل للقارئ غير المتخصص... ربما أرجع للنسخه الكامله لاحقاً
بالنسبه ليا الكتاب ما أضافش كتير ...معظم أفكاره معروفه و بعضها بديهي

فيها يلي ملخص لبعض ما ورد في الكتاب

ليه بننسى معظم الأحلام بعد ما نصحى؟؟
لأن العقل الواعي مش عاوزنا نفتكرها, محتاجين فرويد علشان يطلعه من العقل الباطن :)

ليه أوقات إحساسنا في الحلم بيكون متناقض مع أحداث الحلم (يعني نشوف حادثه أو حد بيموت و منهتمش أو حتى نفرح و العكس, إن شيء تافه يفزعنا أو يفرحنا بدون سبب منطقي)...؟؟
لأن المعنى الحقيقي للحلم مستخبي ورا الإحساس مش الأحداث... في مثال في الكتاب بيتكلم عن واحده شافت في الحلم جنازة إبن أختها و كان شيء عادي ما أثرش فيها أبداً -في الحلم- لكن فرويد بذكائه و تحليله اكتشف إن الجنازه دي كان الهدف منها إنها تشوف حبيب قديم صعب تشوفه غير في مناسبه مهمه :)
و قيسوا على كده

هل الواحد لما بيحلم إنه بيموت حد أو يتمنى موت حد بيكون قصده كده فعلاً؟؟
الإجابه: نعم
أحياناً الواحد يكون متضايق من أبوه مثلاً في وقت من الأوقات و حاسس إنه عقبه في طريق سعادته, العقل الواعي يكبت هذا الإحساس لمده طويله و مش بيلاقي متنفس غير في الحلم

ليه أوقات كتير الحلم بيكون غريب جداً و مش منطقي؟
لدينا في الحلم قطبان... أولهما الرغبه التي يريد النائم أن يحققها, و القطب الثاني هو الرقابه التي تحول دون تحقيق الرغبه إذا لم تحز رضاها... و الرغبه تنبع من اللاشعور, فهي مثل حرس الحدود الذي يمنع غير المرغوب فيهم من الدخول, و على غير المرغوب فيهم في هذه الحاله أن يتنكروا في أشكال و أزياء غريبه كي يفلتوا من الرقابه... و هذا هو السبب في الإلتواء و التنكر أو التشويه الذي يصيب بعض صور الحلم فيسبب لنا ذلك عجزاً عن الفهم و آلاماً أو خوفاً


بناء على تجربة فرويد الشخصيه... الحلم له صله دائماً بأحداث اليوم السابق على الحلم

العقل الباطن يستوعب ملايين المعلومات في الثانيه الواحده في حين أن الواعي يستوعب 7+/- معلومه فقط
الفرق بين الإثنين بيطلع في الأحلام

يعني لو حد حلم إنه شاف شيء ما في مكان ما و لما راح المكان ده لقى الشيء السالف ذكره زي ما شافه في الحلم ...ده معناه إنه كان شافه في المكان ده فعلاً لكن عقله الواعي كان مشغول بحاجه تانيه... و طلع في الحلم علشان الواحد كان عاوز الحاجه دي مثلاً
مش معناه الواحد بقى -شيخ- وبينجم يعني

نقطتين أخيرتين أختلف معاه فيهم شويتين

[☘Misericordia☘ ⚡ϟ⚡⛈⚡☁ ❇️❤❣ · Rating 5 out of 5]

Interesting how realistic and even physiological supposedly gets interpreted with our brains while sleeping.

Of course, it's not really modern studies (nowhere close, for better or worse) but more of anecdotal evidence (not evidence) gathered into nifty little precedents and used to guide both the analyst and the patient (sic! client) to work out the kinks and wrinkles of psyche to mutual satisfation.

[Adam · Rating 4 out of 5]

There is an asinine pastime of bloating one’s self-importance by “proving” that Freud was wrong about something. Such disputation regresses behind what it flatters itself as surpassing and rancorously promulgates nothing but its own failure to comprehend the subject matter. Don’t fall for it. All fetishistic factmongering aside, any page of Freud is sufficient to establish that he was and remains incomparably brilliant. The depth and range, scope and penetration are inimitable. His work is almost convulsively interesting. This is not slavish idolatry, it is appreciation of an irreplaceable and inexhaustible legacy too commonly travestied, one that labored under the keenest self-consciousness of the limitations of merely beginning something that others would have to continue, if they dared. For all his positivist pretenses, Freud never presents as conclusive that which is incipient and exploratory. Psychoanalysis is not a finished Thing, it is an infinite Act, and The Interpretation of Dreams is its opening fanfare.

The book elides any definition: it partakes of nearly every genre theretofore extant, from the scholarly journal to the feverish confessional. It does become tedious and repetitive in the insistent effort to convince by accumulating anecdotes. The entire first chapter does little else than demonstrate Freud’s familiarity with the existing literature on dreams; he is not improvising in a vacuum. The final two chapters, the sixth and seventh, comprise nearly half the bulk of the text, and it is here finally where “Freud becomes Freud,” everything else thus far being largely preparatory. The barrier between our waking rational censorious consciousness and our lurking undisciplined indomitable unconsciousness does not hold. No better invitation and conclusion could there be than Freud’s now famous and summative fighting words:

The interpretation of dreams is the royal road to a knowledge of the unconscious activities of the mind.

[David · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have described before the summer I spent in my wife's home in Kandyla, Greece, where I sequestered myself in the "tholo", or some might call the cellar. It was quiet most of the time and I read all summer and wrote. Self-indulgence to the maximum. During those weeks, I read "Interpretation of Dreams" and learned so much from Dr. Freud and about him, that I still enjoy thinking about it.

For me, what Freud theorized mostly worked. I could hardly wait to discuss what I had been reading with my good friend who was visiting that week. However, when all the family were sitting around the large table filled with food--chicken yakhni in thick tomato sauce, roast potatoes, green onions, sadziki, fresh bread baked in the oven outside and retsina wine from the "vareli" or barrel in the space below where I studied and wrote, he was not in a friendly enough mood to talk about Freud. When I broached the subject of having just read "Dreams" by Freud, he superciliously responded, "What would you know of Freud?", which told me he had not read much of anything about his work and he felt backed into a corner. So, I never was able to learn anything more about Freud from my friend. (I avoided answering his question, since I really knew only what I had read in "Dreams". So, thud!)

Throughout the years, I have found that much of what Freud said rings true, but now I don't hang as much on his conclusions. Sometimes, what I dream and others in the family tell me what they've dreamed about don't match up too much with Freud's theories. Nowadays, I just tell others, when they ask me, that I don't pay much attention to dreams. They're just waste material of the unconscious, which I flush away when I get up in the morning. "Interpretaion of Dreams" is a great read though--almost an adventure in thinking.

[Dimitri · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interpretation of Dreams by Sigmund Freud is filled with Freud’s theories about the connections between dreams and real life that he has discovered through his research. Freud covers everything from the content within dreams to the strategies needed to interpret them, as well as diving in to the finer aspects such as memory in dreams and connections to everyday life. Freud often quotes the extensive research that has already been done in the field of the analysis of dreams but points out that all of the work so far has been inconclusive and in essence raised more questions than it answered. In this work Freud does his best to definitively answer the questions that we still had about interpreting our dreams.

I thought that this book was really fascinating because it answered many of my research questions about the way our subconscious mind is connected to the events of our everyday lives and our memories. The most interesting part to me was the chapter entitled “Memory in Dreams” because he answered so many questions about different obscurities that appear not to be connected to any singular event. He pointed out that people often have dreams about some finite detail that they would never have expected to remember. This passage was so striking because he answered some of my questions about whether our subconscious thoughts are connected to our everyday life. It also made me realize how powerful our mind is and the fact that we actually pick up so many details in everyday life that we might toss away as insignificant but arise in our dreams.

[Maxwell]

Where to begin with Interpreting Dreams? The first hundred pages scrutinizing contemporary scientific literature on dreams is kind of a slog. I don’t think you need to read this section unless you have a strong historical interest in late 19th century medical literature. The concluding paragraphs of each chapter in this part are worth a glance, though, as they thread into Freud’s later descriptive & conceptual appeals. The underlying logic of the text begins here and if nothing else, it demonstrates Freud’s impressive erudition, cogent reasoning & immense gifts as a reader and author of literature. His every appraisal is measured & fair, committed to a thorough scientific positivism. And as a writer, his sentences are an admirable balance of felicitous, pellucid and sophisticated, never sacrificing style in favor of rigor; nor, astonishingly, the other way round. Freud’s winning the Goethe Prize for Literature was richly deserved.

Incidentally, I'm reading the new(ish) Penguin translations of Freud, edited by Adam Phillips. They're less punctilious than the Vintage Classics standard editions, more creative and literary. And where they lack in scrupulousness, these more indulgently stylized translations capture the spirit of Freud as a writer much better. But if you prefer a fussy transplant of his syntax, go Vintage.

After the initial survey, things get weird. You’ve heard the criticisms. Freud was drunk on his implausible theories’ scandalous iconoclasm; either reckless, stubborn or derivative; an inflexible rationalist, derelict sex maniac or a charlatan mystic. A cocaine addict besieged by a reactionary pessimism about the mind as a profane snake pit. There is at least a grain of truth to each of these vituperations, but none discredit his project or come close to telling the whole story.

I think it’s important to understand what Freud was trying to do. Psychoanalysis was unprecedented in many ways & still perches outside the general purview of occidental culture. The human mind is an object as yet untotalizable by any form of inquiry, the pathological mind even moreso, and the mature Freud, the Freud of psychoanalysis, was not a scientist, pathologist or philosopher; he wasn’t testing a hypothesis, administering medicine or doing white gloved speculation. He was trying to heal something that was not, and is not, well understood. This unenviable situation required a method that was hybrid and experimental, with a theoretical animus equally so. The variables of human behavior, the interplay of our idiosyncratic personal histories & temperament, were (and are) too variegated to control for in a traditional laboratory setting. Mental health just isn’t like physical health. But Freud proceeded anyway, abandoning the dominant Cartesian dispositionalist approach to mind which was impossible to square with evidence from his clinical practice. He identified some of the mind’s unconscious congenital patterns, principles and biases, the structuration of which, even today, has a persuasive insight and authority. From his studies a picture of the unconscious, our mind’s subterranean locus of dangerous repressed feelings & libidinal drives, was given shape. Freud didn’t ‘invent the unconscious’, as some claim, but he did formalize the rag-and-bone shop beneath our consciousness into its most resonant account. As Wittgenstein said of Freud, ‘There is an inducement to say, 'Yes, of course, it must be like that.'’

In this system dreams matter because they are the ‘royal road’ to the unconscious. The strangeness of our dreams is an encrypted profundity. Even if we could digitally map or listen to people’s dreams (and I understand this technology is in some stage of development), if we accept the materiality of the unconscious, as most modern neuroscientists do in some shape or another, we could not say prima facie the origin or meaning of the dream work, of its organization and symbology. This is where free association comes in. Our own perspective on our dreams, the particular language we are compelled toward, the associations, affects and memories our dreams spontaneously conjure, will, under the guiding hand of a skilled analyst, produce a strong picture of our unconscious preoccupations, repressions and disturbances. Freud’s meticulousness in developing dream interpretation is entrancing to read. There is much more here than vapid sexual determinism born from century-old analysis of hysterical rich ladies. This book should incite all its readers to begin keeping a dream diary. It did to me.

So is it true? Does it meet the criteria of epistemic naturalism? Can it be legitimated beyond the murky subjectivity of hermeneutics and talking therapy? If such things matter to you, there is a growing body of neuropsychoanalysis which tests Freud’s claims against emergent knowledge in neuroscience. Look up Mark Solms. I’m not sure if this is the best way to read Freud, in spite of Freud himself, as codification into scientific fact is what he desired. But it does seem to be important to people; everyone wants to credit or discredit Freud by materialist standards. Knock yourselves out, I guess.

Whatever your vantage point, we still have so much to learn from Freud. No matter how many times you read him, he is always dead interesting.

[s.penkevich [hiatus-will return-miss you all]]

Me: *over-explaining dream about being late to a job I haven’t worked in years, also flying bears.*
Freud: “hmmm…” *puts pistol in mouth*

[Shaghayegh.l3 · Rating 5 out of 5]

اگه خواب زياد ميبينيد و راجبشون كنجكاويد اين كتاب جامع و كامل خيلى آگاهتون ميكنه ؛ از مهم بودن جزئيات يه روياى قاطى پاتى تا علت خوابايى كه معمولن بين همه مشتركه مثل برهنه بودن يا مردن يكى از عزيزانتون . وقتى تفسيرهاى فرويد و توضيحات دانشمنداى ديگه رو ميخونيد ديگه اين مزخرفات ِ "اگه خواب كسى رو ميبينى يعنى اون تو فكرته" رو باور نميكنى چون تو ذهنت تمام و كمال تعبيه شده كه خواب ها كاملن شخصين و از اتفاقات روز گذشته (اكثرن) و ناخودآگاه و آرزوهاى سركوب شده نشات ميگيرن . با يك عالمه مثال و تعريف خواباى خودش ، اطرافيان و بيماراش .. درعين حال كه كار شاقى بود، چه لذتى داشت خوندن اين كتاب و گرفتن اطلاعاتش ..

[SmarterLilac · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of the books that helped me understand Freud's genius, as well as the value of psychoanalysis. It hurts me so that fewer and fewer people want to understand or appreciate Freud. Yes, I realize that the Freudian perspective, especially on things like dream interpretation, has limited value in non-Western cultures, and that for some, dream interpretation itself may not be the most insightful way to understand the subconscious.

Still--come on. This book changed Europe, and the course of history, as well as humankind's awareness of our inner lives. I love it.

[Théo d'Or]

I've decided to read Freud's book, after a dream I had last night. In my dream, it happened that I was surfing in my favorite place, Saint Malo, on a banana peel, on a sunny summer day, when, suddenly, a huge whale's mouth opened in front of me, then swallowing me entirely. Inside - pitch black. I started looking for something to break the whale's teeth, which were blocking my exit, when I found an old lamp. I dusted it a little, and immediately a bald ghost, with an earring in his third ear and tattooed all over his body with pierced little hearts appeared, horryfyingly howling :
" Aaaah, not now ! I just dreamed that I was with her ! "
" With whom ? "
" Not your business. Say quickly what's your wish, but only one ! I'm exhausted ! One wish, and make it snappy ! ", he grumbles, crossing his arms.
" - Ah...huh... I'd like to spend a night with Sh...wait ! No, I'd like the last model of Chev..Wait ! No, I'd like to be immor...Wait, no, I'd like to ...ah... Actually, I wish for four more lamps, please..."
The ghost's eyes widen. " That's...that's not how this works !
You can't just..."
" - Ah, but you said one wish ! Technically, I'm still within the rules ! " , I say.
The ghost floats there, mouth agape, clearly not used to being outsmarted. He starts to sweat..
Finally, his face lights up.
" - Fine ! " - he exclaims, snapping his fingers. " Four lamps appear with a clatter. But they are all from IKEA, and you have to assemble them yourself ! "
I looked at the heap of little shits, and an immense anger flooded my id, ego and superego...
- Freud !!!!!!! What the hell does that mean ??

[L.S. Popovich · Rating 3 out of 5]

Dreams are more interesting in the midst of the fugue. Waking spoils the coherence. Analysis takes some of the fun out of them, even if it nails a few symbols. More intriguing to me are Joseph Campbell's sort of cultural consciousness archetypes. I feel like there is a lot more here than I wanted to know, but intermingled with Freud's personal anecdotes, which I didn't need, were sufficient ideas and interpretations to invest me for a time. It goes on too long, like a dream about going to the DMV to renew your license, where you wait in line for three hours, watching the clock tick, only to find out you forgot a document, and then you get back to your car and are immediately arrested for driving with an expired license.

[Jana · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was one of those books I tried to read on my own back as a young college student. It wasn't a part of any coursework, so I didn't have anyone to help tie it to larger ideas. If I remember, I think I ended up making my own wacky meaning out of it... which was some sort of Jungian collective UNCS thing or another.

But then I re-read it in grad school in the context of Freud's other work and it began to make a bit more sense. I liked his hypothetical "primal language" because it suggests the existence of symbols as independent of verbal language, which as a visual artist is a notion I'm deeply invested in. This "language" is not then something that is "used" in dreams as a translation from CSNESS, but rather its own more subtle and fluid independent organization of meaning. The "language" is non-linear and non-chronological.

When I think about this idea, I'm reminded of Rapael's Transfiguration: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transfig...
This is one of those pieces where the artist is able to represent (in images one above the other) simultaneous occurrences which can only be read in the original text as one after the other (and then reflected upon as simultaneous).

This play with time is something I like to do in my own work, especially in pulling stills from time-based media so the viewer can enter the work at will rather than be held captive by it (as in, watching a sequence from beginning to end). Internet media satisfy a similar urge.